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CRM and ERP Systems Integration Strengthens Businesses

Businesses often employ two systems to make sure business processes run efficiently - a Client Relationship Management (CRM) system and an Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) system. SAP, Oracle, Salesforce.com, and Microsoft offer on-premise as well as Software as a Service (SaaS) CRM and ERP solutions to businesses of all sizes.

A CRM system deals with front-end information - managing valuable customer data and enriching it through interactions with marketing and customer support. This helps businesses understand prospects and clients, manage relationships and sales pipeline, and upsell and cross-sell products.

An ERP system handles critical backend information - generally managing customer information that is required once orders have been placed. This can include purchase history, billing and shipping details, accounting information, financial data, and supply chain management details.

Both client relationship management and enterprise resource planning systems independently offer substantial benefits to businesses. Employing a powerful integration solution allows for connectivity between the two, providing even more advantages to businesses.

The Integration Challenge

Generally, ERP and CRM systems tend to remain siloed as their contrasting architectures make it difficult to streamline integration. Those who try to create seamless connectivity between the two often turn to custom point-to-point integration. This method is fragile, expensive, and difficult to maintain. With point-to-point connections, a developer needs to manage connectivity and implement changes. Moreover, changes impact the entire system, leaving room for errors. These point-to-point integrations deliver a short-term solution, but become overly complicated as businesses grow.

Another method businesses resort to is “swivel chair” data entry. This method requires an individual to manually retrieve data from one system and enter it into another. Such a procedure is error-prone and takes an extensive amount of time and human resources. Some businesses simplify the task by employing data loaders such as Dataloader.io for Salesforce.com. When working with CRM systems offered by a vendor other than Salesforce.com, however, a different solution is required.

With two different systems unable to communicate with one another, it becomes nearly impossible to track all customer interactions and obtain information through one interface. Sales reps spend time jumping between applications to create a 360 degree view of their customers, slowing down sales processes.

As a lack of integration creates an inefficient workspace, businesses need a robust CRM and ERP integration solution in order to streamline their business processes.

Sharing information and providing visibility into both frontend and backend systems increases productivity and simplifies business process. With CRM and ERP integration, organizations can focus more on driving new business and less on the hassles of trying to make data available.

Furthermore, as many businesses are now employing SaaS and cloud-based applications into their business process, integration of cloud services and applications is important. CloudHub, an integration platform as a service (iPaaS), provides seamless connectivity across the cloud. With Anypoint Connectors as well as customizable integration apps, businesses can integrate applications quickly without having to worry about developing, maintaining, or supporting custom code.

Anypoint Platform makes it possible to integrate Salesforce.com CRM with SAP ERP. This allows business to automate processes and create seamless connectivity. Moreover, synchronizing data to provide an updated customer master list whenever a change is made in either SAP or Salesforce.com can be automated with Mule as an Enterprise Service Bus. Mule offers the tools to gain a clear view of customers, thereby making valuable data from both ERP and CRM systems available to the right people at the right time, all through a single interface. Learn how easy integration is by watching the webinar below, or visiting our SAP Integration and Salesforce Integration pages.

MuleSoft provides a widely used integration platform for connecting SaaS and enterprise applications in the cloud and on-premises. Delivered as a unified integration experience, CloudHub™ and Mule ESB™ (enterprise service bus) are built on proven open source technology for fast and reliable on-premises and cloud integration without vendor lock-in.
Our solutions also include Tcat, an Apache Tomcat server for enterprises.

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